If you’ve ever googled your symptoms wondering if they could point tobreast cancer, you’re not alone.
In fact, there’s been a dramatic surge in the number of Kiwis searching for terms related to breast cancer in 2023.
Google Trends data analysed by the Breast Cancer Foundation shows we searched the word “mammogram” 70 per cent more this year than last year, with “breast cancer symptoms” seeing a 40 per cent increase and “breast cancer” up by 35 per cent.
But these numbers don’t match up with the number of women actually getting screened. In New Zealand, women aged 45 to 69 are eligible for a free mammogram every two years through BreastScreen Aotearoa - but 268,000 of those women didn’t have their free scan last year.
Now one breast cancer survivor - whose first free mammogram turned out to be life-changing - is urging others not to leave it too late.
Karen Roscoe, a mum of three based in the North Shore, was diagnosed with breast cancer in December 2022 after her first ever mammogram.
When she turned 45 and the opportunity came up to get her first free scan, she knew she “couldn’t ignore it” - she’d lost both her great-grandmother and her grandmother to the disease.
“Even though it was in my family, I was naïve enough to think that it would not happen to me,” Roscoe tells the Herald.
Looking back, she “hates to think” what the outcome would have been if she hadn’t gotten a scan. “My story would be very different.”
She recalls feeling “all the emotions” in the moment she was diagnosed.
Karen Roscoe with her two daughters and her friend Suzanne.
“Shock, numb, disbelief, sadness ... I think I just went into my own world for a little bit. I remember the day very well, and sometimes those flashbacks come back,” she says through tears.
Once the initial shock passed, she instantly thought of her daughters, who now have to have mammograms from the age of 35.
“Then once I got over that, I still thought, it’s so much bigger than me and my family,” she recalls.
“I decided that while it was pretty horrible and pretty scary, I had to sit back and go, okay, I have to find something positive in this. They say things happen for a reason, and what’s the reason – I need to help promote breast cancer [awareness].”
She took her daughters along to several of her appointments for treatment and surgery to show them that “it’s not really scary”. “If Mum can do it and Mum can bounce back, then it’s okay.”
And Roscoe wants others to know that getting a mammogram is “not scary”, despite having heard “horror stories” about them herself.
Roscoe pictured with her daughter Anne.
“I can remember going for it and then walking out 10 minutes later and thinking, ‘is that it?’ It was just very quick, simple. I mean, it’s a little bit uncomfortable, but it’s only for a matter of seconds.
“I know that the word ‘cancer’ is scary. But I think it’s more scary for your family to have to go on without you because you left it too late. The word ‘cancer’ doesn’t have to mean the end.”
Now in remission, Roscoe is grateful for the support of her family, friends and work colleagues - and wants to see the age limit for free screenings expanded.
“I mean, how do you put an age on something? People younger than me get breast cancer,” she notes.
“Something has to change there, definitely for the women who are at higher risk and if it’s in the family.”
Low screening rates ‘really worrying’
Breast Cancer Foundation NZ chief executive Ah-Leen Rayner says that in one sense, the rise in Google searches related to breast cancer is “a good thing” as it could point to “increased awareness” of the disease.
“But it could also indicate that more women are worried that they have breast cancer,” she points out.
That worry could be holding women back from getting screened.
“There could be the fear of finding out you have cancer by going for a mammogram. But it’s much better to find out by a mammogram that you’ve got breast cancer than discovering a symptom - because a mammogram will find the cancer while it’s still small and before it’s spread.”
Breast Cancer Foundation New Zealand chief executive Ah-Leen Rayner.
Rayner acknowledges there can also be cultural reasons women feel uncomfortable getting a mammogram, and that backlogs due to Covid-19 are still affecting the number of appointments around the country.
Participation rates in BreastScreen Aotearoa are still well below the 70 per cent target - something that Rayner says is “really worrying”.
“Seventy per cent is the target to see a 30 per cent decrease in deaths through cancer. So if we are under that participation level, what we’ll see is a higher death rate.”
For those who may be hesitant to get screened, she wants to reassure them that the process takes no longer than 10 minutes - it might be uncomfortable for just two - and it could even save your life.
The Breast Cancer Foundation has long campaigned for the screening age bracket to be expanded. Rayner notes that it’s still important to get regular mammograms after the age of 69, when free screening stops, because the risk of getting breast cancer is higher at the age of 70 than the age of 50.
The foundation is also calling on the government to lower the screening age for high-risk women, who include Māori and Pasifika and those with a family history of breast cancer.
But even if you don’t fall within those demographics, Rayner says it’s important to “know your normal” and check your breasts regularly.
“If you do see anything or notice anything that’s unusual, get them checked out by a doctor straight away.”
